Some of the materials I collected on how to create a weekly plan:
Text version can be also found here.
Study Time: π π
- Mind Dump
- Try to write down on a paper or somewhere all the tasks you want to do (e.g. pay the bills, buy the milk, read a book, going gym, and so on ...)
- Setup weekly goals β½
- Identify your area of improvements first (e.g. health, relations, work, mental, and so on ...)
- Setup your weekly goals before the start of the week
- Review your previous week :
- What went wrong? π
- What went well? π
- Hint: Keep track of all your thoughts in a journal. π
- Reoccuring Time Blocks π
- After setting up the goals for the coming week, book the time for all those small and simple activies (e.g. going to gym, read a book, meditate, or pray, or whatever that is recurring.)
- Plan your Big Rocks π»
- "Big Rocks" are the most important tasks in your life.
- Plan the most important tasks first
- Plan everything else around those
- Hint: Look at your Mind Dump
- Fill in the gaps
- Once you have your Big Rocks it's time to plan the other tasks
- These tasks should be the small ones (e.g. Change the oil to your car, pay the bill, and so on ...)
- Hint: Look at your Mind Dump
- Hint: Fill the gaps does not mean fill up all the slots available in the week. It means to have an outline on how we are going to spend our time.
- Review and adjust your plan daily
- Hint: Review the calendar at every evening before going to sleep π΄
- Try to not reschedule the "Big Rocks". Instead, try to rearrange those within the weekly plan.
Study Time: π
"the entire point of planning your week: being able to proactively block time for the things that are most important in your life and business right now."
- Plan your Week before it Starts π
- Schedule everything into your Calendar
- Know your top 3 goals β½
- Have a Weekly Planning Checklist
- Be sure to have a checklist or a template with all the activities to do for the week
- Put your top priorities on the top of the list
- Plan Buffer Times
Study Time: π
Build your business around your life. Not your life around your business.
- Review your todo list the night before
- If you want to build a new habit, or complete a new goal, try to remove all the distractions that can prevent you to develop the new habit or reaching the new goal
- Build a NOT TODO LIST and a TODO LIST
How do I keep this practice? Setup a recurring event on my personal calendar that will notify me few hours earlier.
I prefer to plan my week on Sunday afternoon, just after having had the lunch.
Time boxed activity of: π π π
- Mind Dump 1οΈβ£
- Write down a list of all the things I would like to do next week
- Review my Personal Trello board
- Hint: This is the most important part of my weekly plan. Here I have a big picture of all the things I would like to accomplish, not only for the next week, but also in the long term. Having this vision, help me to understand how to prioritize things! I personally "play" a lot with my trello board.
- Block on your calendar what will matter most the next week 2οΈβ£
- Hint: This is my big event! It's really important and I cannot miss it! β€οΈ
- Example: Travel with my partner
- Identify my three areas of improvement 3οΈβ£
- Select the areas I want to improve this week!
- Hint: It is perfectly fine to have only one area of improvement!
- Identify at most three goals I want to accomplish
- Hint: It is perfectly fine to have only one goal!
- Hint: Goals should be related at least to one area of improvement!
- Hint: Each goal should be "simple and small" enough to be achieved within the week.
- Hint: Sometimes I find helpful to write down the list of bad habits that might sabotage them, and the list of habits I will use to replace the bad ones. This help me to gain more confidence for goals where I believe I might find some difficult.
- Once the goals are identified I try to break them down in smaller steps.
- Hint: Which are the smallest steps that can help me to achieve my goal?
- Select the areas I want to improve this week!
- Block the time on my Personal Calendar 4οΈβ£
- Schedule the time for the goals first
- Schedule the time for all the other minor tasks
- Example: pay the bill, buy something, attending meetup, etc ...
- Hint: One thing that is really effective for me, is to set alarms that reminds me when to do things!
- Daily Review my Weekly plan 5οΈβ£
- DO NOT: Reschedule goals!
- DO: Reschedule minor tasks.
- What to do at the end of the week? 6οΈβ£
- Reflect on what went wrong and what went well. π π